Money Is Indeed Hard to Earn

Thor stepped back in shock, his feet hitting the stone floor with a heavy echo.

The corpse strapped to the conveyor belt suddenly opened its eyes; though its head remained still, its eyeballs darted frantically toward the left.

Upon seeing Thor and Kazi, its pupils dilated sharply and trembled slightly, as if it had caught sight of something exhilarating.

"Is he still alive?" Thor couldn't help but ask Kazi.

"How could that be?" Kazi walked forward with a calm expression and, right in front of Thor, lifted the black leather covering the new apprentice.

Beneath the leather lay a sliced-open chest, the ribs splayed out like wings, leaving the cavity hollow and empty.

Further down, the legs had turned into strips of flesh mixed with dirt and stone.

It had been cut with such precision.

Yet, the apprentice's eyeballs continued to move, tracking Kazi as he paced. Its lips parted slightly, revealing the pearly white teeth within.

Thor felt his stomach churn.

Since transmigrating, he had seen plenty of bloody and terrifying things in the Wizard Tower, which was the only reason he managed to keep from vomiting on the spot.

Now, the trial meant for him had begun.

He forced himself not to look away.

The nausea and dizziness persisted, but Thor kept telling himself that it was just an inanimate corpse, not something that would suddenly stand up and bite half his face off.

His fear subsided slightly.

"His brain died long ago; what remains here is not his original soul. Under normal circumstances, it possesses no aggression." Kazi covered the body with the black leather again and turned to ask Thor, "Are you afraid?"

Thor took a sharp breath of the foul, fishy air.

"I am."

"Oh?" Kazi raised an eyebrow.

"But I can do this."

"Hmph." Mentor Kazi let out a soft snort. "This job isn't for everyone. The corpse before you has already undergone two rounds of processing. To handle the danger and recover materials, these alienated corpses must eventually be specially disposed of; otherwise, they might escape and turn the Wizard Tower into a Ghost Domain. However, before disposal, we can salvage some useful experimental materials. Your task is the final cleanup and sorting."

Kazi's withered hand slapped against the black leather.

"Squelch!"

"You must use your knowledge or your inspiration to identify parts that have become magical due to alienation but are not possessed by ghosts. Dissect them, place them into the different boxes on the table, and close the lids for recovery and preliminary sealing. The rest goes into the large bin below. After you leave tonight, people from outside will collect the boxes and replace them with new ones."

"I will grade your work based on the quantity of useful materials you recover. As long as you submit more than five materials each month, you pass. If you exceed ten, you earn an extra credit."

Kazi tilted his chin toward the still-moving corpse. "Now, tell me, which part do you think is salvageable?"

Thor walked up to the conveyor belt and, gathering his courage, pointed at the twitching eyeballs.

"Does this count as useful?"

"Useless." Kazi remained expressionless.

It seemed that parts appearing active on the surface were not necessarily useful.

It was also possible that because they had been alienated by some strange force, they were already contaminated and could not be reused, rendering them worthless to a wizard.

This money was certainly not easy to earn.

Was a dark-attribute wizard just someone who dealt with corpses and ghosts?

Thor took another deep breath.

He had adapted to the smell; although he still found it foul, it no longer made him want to vomit.

He flipped back the black leather and steeled himself to look.

Perhaps because his mental power had been developed after becoming an apprentice, Thor still felt uncomfortable, but he could now observe the mess on the conveyor belt without being dizzy with fear.

To Thor's naked eye, the mangled corpse looked no different, and for a moment, he couldn't determine what else could serve as wizarding material.

In his peripheral vision, Thor noticed Kazi's left hand tapping incessantly against his right arm; his patience was running thin.

Use my knowledge or my inspiration... but my current knowledge is of no help in distinguishing these things. Then I can only rely on inspiration. What is inspiration? Intuition, or mental power?

Thor's gaze carefully shifted to his left shoulder, but his Hardcover Book only cared about keeping him alive, not helping him earn a living; it remained as quiet as a salted fish.

Thor had only one method left to try.

He stood before the new apprentice's corpse and began to visualize the Human-Monster Walking Diagram.

Without the help of a crystal ball, it was difficult to enter a state of immersion. But his experience in the laboratory last night allowed Thor to enter a semi-meditative state without relying on one.

In this state, he could see elemental particles and things usually invisible to the naked eye.

At this moment, in Thor's vision, the still-moving eyeballs looked like snail antennae extending from the face, swaying up and down, curiously surveying the world.

The corpse's lips were covered in a layer of hard, black thorns.

The teeth beneath the lips shimmered slightly.

Thor stared at the flickering light, finding it somewhat familiar.

It was like the item drop notifications in the games he used to play.

"Looting time, looting time."

"Haven't found it yet? I can give you a hint: there are at least two salvageable parts on this corpse. As long as you find one, you pass."

Kazi's impatient voice interrupted Thor's meditation.

Thor didn't have time to verify if the image from his mental probe was reliable, so he raised a finger and pointed at the corpse's mouth.

Kazi frowned. "You mean his mouth?"

"No, his teeth."

A flash of brief astonishment crossed Kazi's face.

He stepped forward, picked up a thin black rod from the long table behind him, and pried open the corpse's lips.

"Ahem..." He turned back, looking at Thor with a slightly unnatural expression. "That's right, this is one."

Success!

Thor suppressed the excitement in his heart and continued to observe other parts of the corpse using his semi-immersive meditation.

Then, He saw two glowing spots.

Thor pretended to be uncertain and pointed out one of them.

Kazi nodded and asked if he had any other discoveries.

Thor carefully observed the body from top to bottom once more, ignored the last glowing spot, straightened his back, and said to his mentor, "I have no other discoveries."

"Hmm, not bad." Kazi casually pointed out the glowing spot Thor had seen but kept to himself, saying indifferently, "There is another one here."

Next, Kazi verbally instructed Thor to use the tools on the workbench behind him to dissect and salvage the materials. Then, they were placed into three small boxes on the table, covered, and latched.

The remaining parts of the corpse were rolled up in that piece of black leather and placed into a large box under the long table.

That large box was inscribed with a witchcraft array, which had a sealing effect on ghosts and monsters.

Only a large bloodstain remained on the conveyor belt.

Kazi nodded and tilted his chin, signaling Thor to pull the lever by the conveyor belt again.

With the sound of the machine turning, the blood-stained conveyor belt moved beneath the machine, and another corpse emerged from behind the black leather tassels.

Thor saw the head exposed outside the leather, and his eyes narrowed instantly.

This deceased person... he knew her too.

She had tried to seduce Thor when she delivered textbooks on the first day, and she had appeared in Thor's nightmare that night.

That buxom maid!

Why was she dead too?

Was it an accident or foul play?

"You know her?" Watching Thor's expression, Kazi asked in a flat, emotionless voice.

"Yes, she once delivered textbooks to me."

"In the Wizard Tower, death is a very common occurrence."

"If people keep dying like this, what happens when they all run out?"

"We go to nearby towns to recruit people; they are very willing to send people in."

The small talk ended, and Mentor Kazi pointed at the maid. "She has... at least one usable part on her. If you can find it this time, I will hand this job over to you."

Thor perked up. Unable to spare any grief for the maid, he lifted the black leather covering her.

The maid's body was naked, and the long wound on her chest proved she had also been dissected. However, since she was just an ordinary person, although she died under strange circumstances, there weren't many places with residual anomalies on her body.

Unlike the new apprentice from just a moment ago, who was already a light pile of remains when sent into the large box under the table.